LaGuardia wish list: Fewer houses, more businesses

Blooming Grove Supervisor Frank Fornario welcomes big media company and other future employers, By Edie Johnson Blooming Grove — Blooming Grove Supervisor Frank Fornario says Mountco’s plan to build a five-story apartment building and 900-plus “workforce housing” units is “not suitable for our rural area as currently designed.” Mountco Developmenent Corp. of Scarsdale want to develop the former 258-acre Camp LaGuardia site, which spans the Chester/Blooming Grove border. But while Fornario doesn’t like the current plan, he's willing to working with Mountco if the developer is open to making modifications. At a recent presentation before the Chester Town Board, Mountco officials agreed to make their plans more palatable to local residents. Mountco has built thousands of units of Section 8 housing for poor and disabled people. The open questions are whether Mountco’s proposed housing complex will blend into its rural surroundings, or prove viable in a scarce job market. “We shall see,” Fornario said. A work session open to the public on Tuesday, Sept. 6, at Blooming Grove Town Hall is expected to put major questions on the table, including: the number of units and their design, the size commercial space portion of the project, its expected fiscal impact, and its infrastructure needs. Fornario, with the backing of his town board, successfully challenged the county’s plan to extend sewer service to the project. His objection was that the county, which owns the site, failed to consult local towns first. The Town of Chester supported Blooming Grove in its suit but did not join it. The magnitude of the project will depend on how much sewer capacity the developer can obtain. Blooming Grove won the right to have a say in the matter. Depending on the modifications Mountco offers, Blooming Grove may drop the suit and consider an agreement in which the town makes zoning changes to accommodate the project. 'Jobs and houses must go hand in hand' Mountco’s latest plan reduces the project’s commercial development. But Fornario would rather see reductions in houses, not commercial space, which, by generating tax revenue and creating jobs, offsets the school tax burden that comes with houses. (The property is within the boundaries of the Monroe-Woodbury School District.) He wondered why a developer “would even want to build 900 homes in this market.” Recent figures show that local home sales dropped 46 percent this year. Fornario insists the biggest housing need in the area is for veterans and people over 85. Transportation and commercial infrastructure is needed prevent these groups from becoming isolated, he said. The good news, said Fornario, is that the new homes will serve future employees of MediaCom and other businesses sprouting up along the Route 208 corridor. MediaCom has started building a multi-million dollar facility on Old Mansion Road, just off the Museum Village Road exit on Route 17. Future employees of Short Line, which is expected to break ground on its Chester headquarters in the next few weeks, will need housing as well. “The two must go hand in hand,” he said. “New jobs and homes for the employees.” Even with the enhanced tax break offered to MediaCom by the Orange County Industrial Development Agency, Fornario said the big media company will bring a lot of money and attention to a town short on tax rateables. Spreading the word that “Blooming Grove is open for Business,” he even had tee shirts made up to advertise the coup. MediaCom employs 4,600 people in 116 offices in 89 countries. Their clients include Coca-Cola and the Volkswagen Group. The company “handles the media planning and buying for some of the world’s smartest advertisers,” according to its Web site. Fornario said the town is also negotiating for a large assisted living facility interested in building in the same area. As for Mountco, “the towns are obligated to work toward something that will get back the county at least $8.5 million of the cost they paid for the former homeless shelter,” he said. “But not 900 affordable units, but rather, something that will allow the county to break even, make some money for Mountco, and have the least impact on the environment. As long as the town retains control over the infrastructure they retain control the amount of building.” Many of these details should have been worked out awhile ago, he said. But Blooming Grove will tackel some of the more difficult questions at the work session in September, when serious planning will begin.